Transformation of the Software Components and Web Services Market

The Service Oriented Computing paradigm, with as its main manifestation web-service technology, holds high promises, but exploits its full potential only when third-party web-services are traded in a service market to enable effective development of net-enhanced organizations and business networks. After the introduction of software source code libraries and the rise of Software Component Markets (SCMs) since 1999, Web Service Markets (WSM) represent the third wave in the trade of reusable software components. However, very little is known about the current status, structure and trends within the WSM. We present a longitudinal study of the structure of the SCM in 1999, 2000, and 2006 and a study of the WSM in 2006. The SCM has grown into a large, polluted, and un-transparent market of around 30,000 software components, offered by 28 producers, 28 catalogues, and 8 intermediaries. Our study shows that the WSM is emerging and in the early stage of development in 2006. SCM and WSM still have a long way to become transparent and effective mechanisms for organizations to obtain powerful, re-usable, and interoperable components for business networking

Rethinking communication in innovation processes: creating space for change in complex systems

Abstract: In innovation studies, communication received explicit attention in the context of studies on the adoption and diffusion of innovation that dominated the field in the 1940-1970 period. Since then, our theoretical understanding of both innovation and communication has changed markedly. However, a systematic rethinking of the role of communication in innovation processes is largely lacking. This article reconceptualises the role of everyday communication and communicative intervention in innovation processes, and discusses practical implications. It is argued that we need to broaden our perspective on the types of (communicatively supported) intermediation that an innovation process includes and requires. Keywords: innovation, communication, discursive space, intermediaries, everyday tal

Sustainable Development Report: Blockchain, the Web3 & the SDGs

This is an output paper of the applied research that was conducted between July 2018 - October 2019 funded by the Austrian Development Agency (ADA) and conducted by the Research Institute for Cryptoeconomics at the Vienna University of Economics and Business and RCE Vienna (Regional Centre of Expertise on Education for Sustainable Development).Series: Working Paper Series / Institute for Cryptoeconomics / Interdisciplinary Researc

Sustainable Development Report: Blockchain, the Web3 & the SDGs

This is an output paper of the applied research that was conducted between July 2018 - October 2019 funded by the Austrian Development Agency (ADA) and conducted by the Research Institute for Cryptoeconomics at the Vienna University of Economics and Business and RCE Vienna (Regional Centre of Expertise on Education for Sustainable Development).Series: Working Paper Series / Institute for Cryptoeconomics / Interdisciplinary Researc

Tackling food marketing to children in a digital world: trans-disciplinary perspectives. Children’s rights, evidence of impact, methodological challenges, regulatory options and policy implications for the WHO European Region

There is unequivocal evidence that childhood obesity is influenced by marketing of foods and non-alcoholic beverages high in saturated fat, salt and/or free sugars (HFSS), and a core recommendation of the WHO Commission on Ending Childhood Obesity is to reduce children’s exposure to all such marketing. As a result, WHO has called on Member States to introduce restrictions on marketing of HFSS foods to children, covering all media, including digital, and to close any regulatory loopholes. This publication provides up-to-date information on the marketing of foods and non-alcoholic beverages to children and the changes that have occurred in recent years, focusing in particular on the major shift to digital marketing. It examines trends in media use among children, marketing methods in the new digital media landscape and children’s engagement with such marketing. It also considers the impact on children and their ability to counter marketing as well as the implications for children’s rights and digital privacy. Finally the report discusses the policy implications and some of the recent policy action by WHO European Member States

Impact in networks and ecosystems: building case studies that make a difference

open accessThis toolkit aims to support the building up of case studies that show the impact of project activities aiming to promote innovation and entrepreneurship. The case studies respond to the challenge of understanding what kinds of interventions work in the Southern African region, where, and why. The toolkit has a specific focus on entrepreneurial ecosystems and proposes a method of mapping out the actors and their relationships over time. The aim is to understand the changes that take place in the ecosystems. These changes are seen to be indicators of impact as increased connectivity and activity in ecosystems are key enablers of innovation. Innovations usually happen together with matching social and institutional adjustments, facilitating the translation of inventions into new or improved products and services. Similarly, the processes supporting entrepreneurship are guided by policies implemented in the common framework provided by innovation systems. Overall, policies related to systems of innovation are by nature networking policies applied throughout the socioeconomic framework of society to pool scarce resources and make various sectors work in coordination with each other. Most participating SAIS countries already have some kinds of identifiable systems of innovation in place both on national and regional levels, but the lack of appropriate institutions, policies, financial instruments, human resources, and support systems, together with underdeveloped markets, create inefficiencies and gaps in systemic cooperation and collaboration. In other words, we do not always know what works and what does not. On another level, engaging users and intermediaries at the local level and driving the development of local innovation ecosystems within which local culture, especially in urban settings, has evident impact on how collaboration and competition is both seen and done. In this complex environment, organisations supporting entrepreneurship and innovation often find it difficult to create or apply relevant knowledge and appropriate networking tools, approaches, and methods needed to put their processes to work for broader developmental goals. To further enable these organisations’ work, it is necessary to understand what works and why in a given environment. Enhanced local and regional cooperation promoted by SAIS Innovation Fund projects can generate new data on this little-explored area in Southern Africa. Data-driven knowledge on entrepreneurship and innovation support best practices as well as effective and efficient management of entrepreneurial ecosystems can support replication and inform policymaking, leading thus to a wider impact than just that of the immediate reported projects and initiatives

New governing experts in education: Self-learning software, policy labs and transactional pedagogies

The governance of education is increasingly intertwined with database technologies.This chapter examines the emergence of the ‘public policy lab’ as a new actor ineducational governance with governing expertise in data technologies and techniques. Drawing on a study of the think tank Demos, the social enterprise the Innovation Unit, and Nesta (the National Endowment for Science, Technology and the Arts) in England, the chapter shows how these organizations promote themselves as intermediary governing experts. Utilising new software technologies, they exercise the capacity to diagnose the problems of contemporary schooling, and to activate the competencies of learners as governing resources to solve those problems

The Digitalisation of African Agriculture Report 2018-2019

An inclusive, digitally-enabled agricultural transformation could help achieve meaningful livelihood improvements for Africa’s smallholder farmers and pastoralists. It could drive greater engagement in agriculture from women and youth and create employment opportunities along the value chain. At CTA we staked a claim on this power of digitalisation to more systematically transform agriculture early on. Digitalisation, focusing on not individual ICTs but the application of these technologies to entire value chains, is a theme that cuts across all of our work. In youth entrepreneurship, we are fostering a new breed of young ICT ‘agripreneurs’. In climate-smart agriculture multiple projects provide information that can help towards building resilience for smallholder farmers. And in women empowerment we are supporting digital platforms to drive greater inclusion for women entrepreneurs in agricultural value chains